Electric bowed musical instruments, e.g., stringed instruments of the violin family (violin, viola, cello, bass), have been available for decades, since at least the 1970s. Electric instruments differ from amplified acoustic instruments in that they produce only a faint sound when they are not powered. In a conventional electric guitar or violin, for example, sound is generated electronically by sensing string vibration, as opposed to setting up an acoustic standing wave within the body of the instrument. Consequently, such electric stringed musical instruments need not provide a box for amplifying acoustic waves. Therefore, many form factors are possible—electric stringed musical instruments can have a solid body, a partial body, or a very minimal body—just a fingerboard and strings. Electric stringed instruments allow the performing artist to create many different sound colors that are not possible using a traditional acoustic instrument, or an amplified acoustic instrument. However, existing electric guitars and violins are still equipped with strings, and it is the string vibration that is sensed to produce amplified sound.
Numerous designs for stringless guitars have been proposed. However, some stringless guitars are more like electronic toys than musical instruments because they do not create sound by sensing and shaping a physical vibration. A stringless bowed musical instrument was disclosed by the present inventor in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 14/534,162, which is incorporated by reference herein in its entirety. In place of strings, the stringless bowed musical instrument features a vibrational bowing platform equipped with bow sensors, and pressure-sensitive or optical pitch sensors that sense finger placement along a fingerboard. Various embodiments of the bowing platform include a uni-track platform and a multi-track platform, either of which can be attached to the body of the instrument, or to the end of the fingerboard.